People v. Avila

Opinion

YEGAN, J.

We hold that an incarcerated defendant charged with threatening the life of or threatening serious bodily harm to an elected public official within the meaning of Penal Code section 761 need not have a “stated release date” to have the “apparent ability to carry out that threat.”

Daniel Avila was convicted in a jury trial of six counts of making criminal threats (§ 422), and six counts of threatening elected public officials, here six deputy district attorneys (§ 76). The trial court sentenced appellant to prison for six years four months for the section 422 offenses. (§ 654.)…